The Daisy family, scientifically known as Asteraceae, is the largest family of flowering plants in the world having over 32,000 species! It comprises mostly herbaceous plants especially in the UK, and makes up a huge portion of our most showy and valued flowers. Asteraceae is so large it’s incredibly varied, and the only shared characteristic within the family are the flowers which we will explore in more detail.
By Forager Kelly
Uses and edibility
Loved by herbalists for its plethora of medicinal properties from plants like Echinacea, Arnica, Milk thistle and Chamomile to name a few. Some of our food crops come from the Daisy family like lettuce, sunflowers and artichokes. For the forager it’s a real mixture, there’s some wonderful edibles but unfortunately some poisonous ones too. There are no golden rules to pick out the edibles unfortunately like there are in some other families. However you can, from the flowers at least narrow it down to the Asteraceae family which is a huge win!
Just please be aware some individuals can be sensitive to this family – learn more about it here
A few of best edible in the Family for the Forager…
Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale),
Yarrow (Achillea millefolium),
Ox eye daisy (Leucanthemum vulgare),
Common daisy (Bellis perennis),
Some of the poisonous Daisies to watch out for…
Groundsel (Senecio vulgaris)
Winter heliotrope (Petasites pyrenaicus)
How to Identify the Daisies
Aster as in Asteraceae means star, named for the shape of the flowers. The majority of the flowers in this family have what’s called disk inflorescence or compound (composed of two or more) flower heads.
A flower as we know generally means the seed bearing part of the plant containing the reproductive organs, but in different species of plants there may be one individual seed producing structure then surrounded by petals or if in the daisy family, multiple or even 100s together forming a central disk surrounded by petals ( known as ray florets).
An excellent example of this magnified is a sunflower, which I’m sure you will have noticed is a central disk of many seeds.
1. A central disk on the flower
2. Large number of petals
The vast majority of daisy family flowers have numerous petals, for any flowers with 8-30 plus petals I would start my inquiry in this family first.
However there are a few exceptions like Yarrow with 5 and Pineapple Weed with none.
So now hopefully on your walks you’ll feel more confident on recognising the Daisy family!